Monster Champion Feedback

[Angelic-council]

I like the Champion system as it adds:

1. Monster randomness

2. Challenge

3. A wake up call to those grind robots


Although I do agree that they could use some tweaking, but I am in the crowd that likes them and if "newbies" or casual players cant take the heat, they should play on a lower difficulty and improve their toon and/or playstyle.

Overall, please, Turbine Developers, keep up the good work.

+1

I absolutely agree, maybe champions could use "some" tweaking, maybe. But it's a good system. You don't have to be super uber, you can do it and we done it before. It's all about strategy and tactics, also team work in some cases.

[Blackheartox]

Will add again, no idea if i wrote here.

Question, are there champion buff iterations that makes them immune to cc?
I would like if you could add some kind immunity to enchantment/power words/balanced attacks/shiradis nerve.
Well basically any ability that causes helpless to some champ mobs, and make it rather a high chance since it feels cheap to me that i as sorc can never be touched by champs due to my cc.
I mean i do let them hit, since im a bit of the m nature, but that isnt the point xD

That is mainly so that ranged dont favor from this change compared to melle, like add it at same rate as dward and tseing are

[Powerhungry]

Try to solo end game raids in wow and report here how it goes

Wow still has a player base to create groups

[Grosbeak07]

Playing today, I've had zero issues with Champions. Did demon web quests, no deaths (not even hirelings) and didn't really notice that much more of a challenge. Guess either I'm super awesome or super lucky, but I haven't seen any of the issues others have reported.

[Powerhungry]

Playing today, I've had zero issues with Champions. Did demon web quests, no deaths (not even hirelings) and didn't really notice that much more of a challenge. Guess either I'm super awesome or super lucky, but I haven't seen any of the issues others have reported.

EH or EE?
What's build type?
TR/eTR?
Uber gear?

[jalont]

Shroud blades and flenser Polar Rays were quietly toned down. That's why no one talks about it any more. The water works mandatory acid trap was basically turned off as far as I can tell. But the real damage these things caused before being fixed was really in dollar terms, not hit points. Pitchforks are needed when the health of the game is at stake.

Where have you been as we've complained about the further casualization of the game? Where have you been as the player base has plummeted while the game has gotten easier and easier. You've been noticeably silent.

[Ladywolf]

I love the monster champions

[Connman]

Someone earlier mentioned that we didn't get any flavor text with the monster champions. I don't have any D&D themed ideas, but I do have a DDO idea,


So the monsters are all like "Man these adventurers are really tough, they come in here and just go wherever they want and ravage us. We need help."

Then it dawns on them, "We need to put up a LFM!"




And of course since there is no lack of monsters their group fills pretty quick.



Of course most of the guys that click those STRONGS ONLY LFM's go down like the rest, but some, just a few, here and there, can ONE SHOT US BACK.

Well done.

[Stonemerge]

Adding champs to hard and elite was the way to go to bring some challenge into the game as well as some element of randomness, while preserving norm and casual for more casual player types and new folks.

But i am no casual player ... im here since DDO is F2P. I play each day around 12-16 hours (no, im not proud of that, im a nerd with no job or family)
I capped more than 100 toons in all those years - made pictures - then deleted them ... but i have 10 toons that i want to keep forever ... with new changes i need to respec them from time to time, but they keep their race and looks and role. One of them has not all EDs full, i wanted to do this until this years end and then finally work on my mains goal: TripleCompletionist. All of my 100+ toons were 1st lifers and i leveled them on hard only (times were harder then).
The last 2 years I tr'd my favorite 10 toons and gave them full EDs (20 mio xp * 10), still did some lvl20-fun-builds and learned how to 6 star challenges. I gathered all the gear i want (i.e. Royal Guard Masks for each of them - can u imagine how long this took ?). My Crafter is now 170/170/170 - i have gathered practically all items one can collect (more inventory plz), i gathered thousands of tokens for my to-be completionist. And when i joined ee- runs in the last months (for favor only) i was mostly the killcount leader or no 2. Nonetheless only one my toons is able to solo (higher level) epic elite quest and i dont care - because I dont like to kill lvl 80 rats. I would love if there would be more lowlevel quests in eberron instead - i am a perfectionist, but not an elitist in any way. Do i fear i am not able to do heroic elites anymore ? not really - i guess i will 1-hit kill everything. Why am i so angry then ? Wasting my time with champions for no gain (gimme xp for them, make me smile when i see them) and NO - NO - NO - onhitkills - if anything kills without a chance to react - then this is the same as a lag death - oh wait - ppl wanted a challenge - thats why everyone is crying about lag - they did not understand that lag is just another level of challenge to spice up the game experience for vets. (really - where is the difference ... learn the game lol - there is no way to prevent 6000+ damage)

its a game - it should be fun - and we all have different opinions what fun is - make the best game for everyone - not just 1%

OptIn/OptOut

[Archangel666]

Someone earlier mentioned that we didn't get any flavor text with the monster champions. I don't have any D&D themed ideas, but I do have a DDO idea,


So the monsters are all like "Man these adventurers are really tough, they come in here and just go wherever they want and ravage us. We need help."

Then it dawns on them, "We need to put up a LFM!"




And of course since there is no lack of monsters their group fills pretty quick.



Of course most of the guys that click those STRONGS ONLY LFM's go down like the rest, but some, just a few, here and there, can ONE SHOT US BACK.

Well done.

Amusing. Reminded me of this.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...!!!!-Epic-Fail

[Dorian]

wow... how could you get all those Champions to spawn in the same room. According to a Dev, the spawn rate is working as intended at 10%

[Wipey]

Ok, good smart*** response.

On a serious note:
In real life: Sure
In a fantasy game that's meant to be fun: No...

Didn't mean to be a smartass sorry, just trying to lighten up the mood a bit.

Anyway, fresh experience.
Duo EE Breaking the ranks with Blitzing monkcher, me on Palemaster.
I HAD to cc those yellow crowns, immediately dance if the break out from 66 dc Disco or hold.
I had to pay attention to kiting or cc Shadar kai trash at the end. Arcane Surge, debuffs, be sure webs land. Because one hit on 900 hp / 60 prr almost kills me. Almost.

Trio EE Wgu, same monkcher, Fury BF pally, I brought my "squishy " Tempest for fun.
Have to Fury or kite and pay attention, first orc group, two champs, well I'd better not jump in the middle of those.
So 850hp/110 Blitz prr toon, NEVER one shot. Maybe 250- 400 hits from Shadarkais and 400 -600 from Orcs or Ice ellies.

Died first time, fighting group of orcs with 2 champions at the bridge alone. Could have avoided it by better play.
Monkcher died at one point, I just popped MS and Blitz, well now I got bunch of ellies on my arse. Well tough luck
We managed with four deaths, 2 mine on relatively squishy 850 hp/80-110 prr melee.
It's total blast !

People should stop the exaggerations, EE ready toon DOES NOT get one shotted. Again, don't know about new content.

[LevelJ]

Monster Champions only have a chance to have True Seeing and/or Deathward. Some Champions won't have either one. We certainly expect players to use instant kill abilities on many Champions.

The exact chances to have True Seeing and Deathward are, of course, subject to change. We didn't want these to be very low, as that also reduces the tactical variety that's used -- not every champion should be instant killed or entirely invis-zerged past.

True seeing was always a headache for me...and not because of invis. It wrecks one of my custom builds that relies a lot on Displacement/Incorporeal miss chances (TS hits through Displacement/Blur), and it doesn't seem fair that that Displacement users should have to face a displacement-bypass more often than other buffs simply because devs want to avoid zerging by using True Seeing's invisibility negation trick.

Therefore, might I suggest an alternative? Cut back the chance of TS appearing on champs to the same standards of the other potential buffs, then add See Invisibility to the list of buffs and scale that one so that between it and TS, the chance of one of them showing is about the same as TS currently is. This way people who use displacement/blur are not exempt, but they aren't singled out either.

Also, I highly agree with making these buffs dispellable. It works for mobs, is would be nice if it worked for us. Dispel doesn't get enough use these days...Mordekaien's gets even less use. Feel free to make the DC's competitive, but not overkill. And it makes me less disappointed about Death Ward existing more often than other buffs.


Anyway, onto my experiences. My time on Lamania was only before the champions were introduced, so yesterday was my first encounter with them. My guildy and I had just TR'd, so we encountered our first champions in Elite Korthos. I was under the false assumption that they didn't appear at that lvl, and as a result, I got 80% of my HP dropped before my guildy shot back-to-back champs down. Now I was a rogue and unprepared, but I would agree that champs seem to appear a bit too often, especially in areas with large mobs.

We don't expect brand new players to be playing Heroic Elite most of the time.

Now I don't mind the concept of champions...it is a nice idea. But Korthos?? Maybe new players don't run Elite, but they're in for a nasty surprise if they decide to try a run on Hard after completing something simple like Cannith Crystal. We had quite a few champions in there (about 4 or so per run). I understand giving skilled players a challenge, but this may end up isolating new players to Normal difficulty for a while. This may not be terrible by itself, but there have already been at least a few discussions about how there aren't enough motivations for Normal difficulty lfms anymore to help new players. So pretty much they are required to try to find a group of like-minded individuals to run Normal with them...not always easy.

Two ideas to give new players a way to adjust gradually (while not totally letting low level vets off the hook)...

1) Remove champions from Korthos on all but Elite, but even then, lower rate of appearance. Once it gets to harbor, it can go back to regular rates

2) Since the concept of what champions isn't very well explained in the actual game (outside forums/wiki in other words), a short new tutorial-esque quest in Korthos might be helpful to introduce the concept. It doesn't have to be much, the 'Champion Sauhagin/Cultist' or something that needs to be stopped before or after Korthos has been saved. A short area, and rather than a red named end boss, a champion. The quest giver NPC can explain the concept of champions in greater detail. This gives an opportunity for players to 'practice' against a guaranteed champion, so when they face unexpected ones, they aren't caught completely off-guard.

I honestly don't know how to fix the problem of LFM exclusion, but that doesn't have as much to do with this topic as the above stuff.

Finally, four bugs to mention related to Cordovan's request on livestreams to watch for any Champions who shouldn't be as such.

1) The sleeping Scrag/Giant in the Korthos quest, Stopping the Sauhagin. I have a picture of a giant crown on his head, that I would upload if I knew how to.

2) Friendly NPC's. Amalgam was a champ when my guildy and I ran Redemption on Elite in Korthos. It made defending Heyton really easy, but that's not the point of Elite. It pains me to say this, but it needs to be fixed, along with any other friendly NPC's who fight.

3) Drusen d'Jorasco in Necromancer's Doom had a crown, and she doesn't even have HP

4) Placement of Treasure Chests when they drop from Orange Names is dependent on where they die. Please make it appear where the Orange Named initially spawns, so it ends up not floating in the air or in difficult locations. My guildy and I had a hilarious yet annoying episode in Sacrifices where after killing the champion Dreynel Fallow, a chest spawned in the water that flowed downhill to where he spawned, and it took several attempts of being washed away from it before we finally got the blasted thing open and looted. And yea, something unique in the chest would be nice.


-Jayron

[Braegan]

You just ignored this fact AGAIN: Waterworks Kobold Shamen Champs throwing lightning bolt for 850. There have been many other reports of champs doing one-shot damage at all levels. Up to 6k damage in the highest quests. Or are you saying that everyone is lying?

Well I wouldn't say they are lying, but I haven't seen it yet.

I didn't see any 6k crits last night either.

Just to check it out, I brought a 1st lifer level 6 Cleric/1 Fighter with Energy Resist 5 (Ship Buff) and a Reflex save of 9 into Butchers Path Elite. Now yes I am a couple levels over but it wouldn't matter if they hit for 850. The highest damage I took after letting a Champ Kobold Shaman spam spells at me was under 40 points of damage from a lightning bolt. It had the I hit Hard Buff, and a couple others. I don't know is there one that makes their spell power go from casting 40 point lightning bolts to 850?

I think if we are going to get anywhere in a discussion folks need to be more complete about their findings instead of rage-zomg-somuchdamage-rage-quitthegame-rawr.

Post details people. But complete, be polite and a proper discussion on the balance of the champs can happen.

[FestusHood]

My recommendations for new and casual players;
Designed to slow down your acquisition of free DDO store points to buy adventure packs -> means they are trying to suck money out of you
Designed to create more instadeaths for Melees not preventable by gear -> means they are trying to suck more money out of you
Designed to create more inventory clutter with extra chests, buy more inventory -> means they are trying to suck money out of you
Designed to get you to burn thru more HP and SP, buy more HP and SP pots -> means they are trying to suck more money out of you
Designed to slow down favor to acquire things like drow, 32 point, monk -> means they are trying to suck more money out of you

It scares me how much sense this makes to me right now.

It's been said that it doesn't matter how small the playerbase becomes as long as those that remain spend enough money. I'm afraid this will be an extreme test of that theory.

[lyrecono]

As has been said many times: how is russian roulette equal to making the game more difficult? "You're dead" isn't harder, just more irritating.

maybe i failed with the translation.
what i meant was;
when difficulty goes up you can build better, gear better, play better.
i can not gear/build (a melee) against 5600 slashing damage or 2k force damage whille having near 200prr, how do i play around that?
EE miror room, waves of spawns in a small room, party changed into a rez fest
When i was in EE i had the feeling i was playing rusian roulete with every champion that spawned, there was a 1 in 6 chance it targeted me with a high chance of 1 shotting me.
the the roulette refrence was to underline the "no way to get out of failure" chance.
So yes, a pointless change


To the dev's
Heroic&epic:
remove it or allow for an opt out, you're hurting part of your own income

I understand why you want to crib of diablo and path of exile, a large chunk of your playerbase went those games (around U19-ish) but atleast do it right:
better visual representation, as a melee i don't have the luxery of selecting a mob and investegating it for buffs
tone down the damage, i might have had a 2600hp tank, 2k damage is insane, let allone the 5k slashing gargoyle or the 4k damage beholder.

for years i have pugged heroic content in order to meet new people, many players might remember the advice and gear given to them, this wil stop, social element doesn't weigh up against the levelscaling, slower quest completions and 10% exp penalty.
from what i heard, you also screwed over permadeath.......


Implement an opt out check-box!

Are we getting through here?

[Braegan]

But i am no casual player ... im here since DDO is F2P. I play each day around 12-16 hours (no, im not proud of that, im a nerd with no job or family)
I capped more than 100 toons in all those years - made pictures - then deleted them ... but i have 10 toons that i want to keep forever ... with new changes i need to respec them from time to time, but they keep their race and looks and role. One of them has not all EDs full, i wanted to do this until this years end and then finally work on my mains goal: TripleCompletionist. All of my 100+ toons were 1st lifers and i leveled them on hard only (times were harder then).
The last 2 years I tr'd my favorite 10 toons and gave them full EDs (20 mio xp * 10), still did some lvl20-fun-builds and learned how to 6 star challenges. I gathered all the gear i want (i.e. Royal Guard Masks for each of them - can u imagine how long this took ?). My Crafter is now 170/170/170 - i have gathered practically all items one can collect (more inventory plz), i gathered thousands of tokens for my to-be completionist. And when i joined ee- runs in the last months (for favor only) i was mostly the killcount leader or no 2. Nonetheless only one my toons is able to solo (higher level) epic elite quest and i dont care - because I dont like to kill lvl 80 rats. I would love if there would be more lowlevel quests in eberron instead - i am a perfectionist, but not an elitist in any way. Do i fear i am not able to do heroic elites anymore ? not really - i guess i will 1-hit kill everything. Why am i so angry then ? Wasting my time with champions for no gain (gimme xp for them, make me smile when i see them) and NO - NO - NO - onhitkills - if anything kills without a chance to react - then this is the same as a lag death - oh wait - ppl wanted a challenge - thats why everyone is crying about lag - they did not understand that lag is just another level of challenge to spice up the game experience for vets. (really - where is the difference ... learn the game lol - there is no way to prevent 6000+ damage)

its a game - it should be fun - and we all have different opinions what fun is - make the best game for everyone - not just 1%

OptIn/OptOut

There have always been risks of dying in DDO, less over the years but that did make the game more fun and is something they are trying to get back to.

Remember your first Ogre encounter? A triple crit smack would kill just about any at level character.

Kobold Shaman and Hobgoblin esp on Hard spamming Hold Person can kill an at level character pretty quick too.

Getting back to a game where there was some challenge instead of facerolling content is a good thing. These really large numbers I have yet to see. More detail would be nice from posters claiming this.

I for one welcome our new champion overlords.

[Sehenry03]

Ok so lets get one thing out of the way...SOME people are WAY over exaggerating champion mobs.

Yes some of the champs are out right NASTY and some other still die in one hit. They said it would be random. I ran Elites all day yesterday and yes I did die 5-6 times I also still soloed a lot of content and I grouped a lot of content. I ran WW 4 times for xp and to help a few new players get some end rewards. I was one shotted once by a kobold with lightning bolt. he double bolted me at 100 and 100. One of the new players grabbed my stone and ran to the shrine. After I rebuffed I went back to said kobold and tripped him and killed him. CC for the win. I have to cry foul on the 850 bolt in WW.

I also was one shotted doing the new quests on EE once and a few guildies were one shotted. We adapted and overcame and moved on.

Would people STOP saying new players aren't gonna be able to do HH or HE anymore? They should never have been able to solo those in the first place. In groups sure and I bet a lot of new players will do better then some vets because they didn't get spoiled by zerging everything. New players should be running normal on most things and maybe casual if they want to learn the content.

A new player will be getting plenty of xp leveling off normal quests and they don't NEED to run HH or HE without help. Now once they get to 20 and TR they will have some better gear and HH will be quite viable to them even with champions.. So they now solo HH quests which will easily get them to 20 again.

At THIS point they have more gear and will be able to start soloing SOME HE quests and some HH quests and they will learn which ones.

My take on a lot of this is that people that didn't spend o lot of time raiding/farming for top gear expect to be able to solo EH or EE content. Sorry guys that's not how it works. EH should be for groups of "casual" players. Casual is not bad it just means they don't have time to focus on the game like they might want to. Players that CAN farm/raid will be able to handle EE content better then most but skill of the player is still key no matter how well geared.

Champions are not hurting new players at all. They will play on normal or maybe hard with a group and they will adapt. Why are people assuming all new players play on elite? What other game does a new player jump in and play elite quests?

Champions are not hurting anyone really except those players who think they are entitled to only play a few hours and still want to solo EE content. Won't happen. It is not biased against you its just not how it should be. If you are not a top tier player then you need to get help. Its the same in WoW and Wildstar and other games. All champions are doing is giving a challenge to those who want it at the highest level of skill...and those that don't can still run normal content for an easier run and they can play around with hard content to see if they can do it or not.

The people whining that elite is now to hard should stop feeling entitled. The game WITH champions helps out a LOT of people. The best players get more challenge and the players without as much gear or experience can still level off normal.

[bennyson]

maybe i failed with the translation.
what i meant was;
when difficulty goes up you can build better, gear better, play better.
i can not gear/build (a melee) against 5600 slashing damage or 2k force damage whille having near 200prr, how do i play around that?
EE miror room, waves of spawns in a small room, party changed into a rez fest
When i was in EE i had the feeling i was playing rusian roulete with every champion that spawned, there was a 1 in 6 chance it targeted me with a high chance of 1 shotting me.
the the roulette refrence was to underline the "no way to get out of failure" chance.
So yes, a pointless change


To the dev's
Heroic&epic:
remove it or allow for an opt out, you're hurting part of your own income

I understand why you want to crib of diablo and path of exile, a large chunk of your playerbase went those games (around U19-ish) but atleast do it right:
better visual representation, as a melee i don't have the luxery of selecting a mob and investegating it for buffs
tone down the damage, i might have had a 2600hp tank, 2k damage is insane, let allone the 5k slashing gargoyle or the 4k damage beholder.

for years i have pugged heroic content in order to meet new people, many players might remember the advice and gear given to them, this wil stop, social element doesn't weigh up against the levelscaling, slower quest completions and 10% exp penalty.
from what i heard, you also screwed over permadeath.......


Implement an opt out check-box!

Are we getting through here?

Did you not notice that the player gets turned into glass in the mirror room?

[lyrecono]

ran 56 quest today, pugging from lv 1, had 2 or more deaths each quest, all elite streaking, lv 150+shipbufs+30 resist energy
ballanced party, 1 cleric (me), 1 sorc, 1 paladin, 1 rog, 1 barb, 1 monk, al tr vets, all aware of the changes
1200(rounded down) damage from a firebal in a lv 2 quest (the paly was in full plate and shield&def stance mode)
60+ damage per hit from a swarm of champion spiders in the catacombs
850 damage from lighning casting shaman in WW
besides al the useless deaths, the imunities, resistances and hp increases (1300hp non red named spider in the catacombs.....) make the journey through their a boring slog, the mobs die but much slower.

with all the party deaths costing me 10% exp everytime i feel inclined to invis&solo to speed things up
thumbs up for another nail in the lfm's coffin.
not that we're getting an overflow of newer players but this widens the gap between vets and newer players even more

seriously Cordovan, dev's, put in an opt out, this system is chasing of newer/weaker players and wastes my time


Edit, you can no longer say: get better saves, or better ac (paly had 66ac), more hp, etc, it just turned into rusian roulette, no longer does it mater if you are a tripple heroic, epic and iconic completionist, have mad skills, somethimes 12 champions spawn right on top of you and kill you, somethimes a rare pops and does 6 times the damage of your max hp, no amount of heal amp or prr/mrr helps here, it's unballanced, it's a slog, it's a waste of time, that could have been spend fixing the quests, bugs or the barbarian class

Well I wouldn't say they are lying, but I haven't seen it yet.

I didn't see any 6k crits last night either.

Just to check it out, I brought a 1st lifer level 6 Cleric/1 Fighter with Energy Resist 5 (Ship Buff) and a Reflex save of 9 into Butchers Path Elite. Now yes I am a couple levels over but it wouldn't matter if they hit for 850. The highest damage I took after letting a Champ Kobold Shaman spam spells at me was under 40 points of damage from a lightning bolt. It had the I hit Hard Buff, and a couple others. I don't know is there one that makes their spell power go from casting 40 point lightning bolts to 850?

I think if we are going to get anywhere in a discussion folks need to be more complete about their findings instead of rage-zomg-somuchdamage-rage-quitthegame-rawr.

Post details people. But complete, be polite and a proper discussion on the balance of the champs can happen.

I have, the fireball got us by suprise, korthos was fast and easy, but butchers path deserved it's name. Warlock_Cyressy spawned, some went ahead, i was running up the ladder at the end when i saw 4 man drop at once, even the def stance platemail&shield paladin died, all 4 went from full hp to dieing in 1 shot, someone posted the damage, 1.2k.
Thats insane, not because 4 random toons died but because those toons died. 4 uber geared toons with tons of pastlives and many years of exp. all had shipbufs and 30+ resists.
It changed into a pot chugging fest, how are the other caster dealing with this? Spending more mana? more pots?